Mayor Kenney Introduces New Fire And Prisons Commissioners
By Pat Loeb
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney introduced his new fire and prisons commissioners at a press conference Tuesday afternoon.
Mayor Kenney says it's time for a new set of eyes on the fire department, so he went to Virginia to find new commissioner Adam Thiel.
"The breadth and width of his knowledge when it comes to all hazards and the number of positions he's held in multiple states will bring the best practices here to Philadelphia that we sorely need," said Kenney.
Thiel replaces Derrick Sawyer who'd been commissioner for the final year-and-a-half of the Nutter administration and was too closely tied, for Kenney, to policies such as brown-outs and staff rotations that Kenney has ended.
Kenney says the department continues to feel the effects of unpopular Nutter administration policies. Thiel says he's prepared to deal with that.
"Please rest assured I hold no illusions about the challenges that are set before us but if there's one thing I know about my brothers and sisters in this business, it's that they never shy away from a challenge," said Thiel.
The city's prisons will get their first female commissioner in Blanche Carney, who has served in the city's prisons for 21 years, and who has focused on the rehabilitative side of prison, an important factor as Kenney seeks creative alternatives to incarceration.